Temporary File And Cache Cleaner Free Up Space
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Temporary File And Cache Cleaner Mac OS Includes Maintenance

In researching this article, I discovered that a number of cache files used by the Steam gaming platform had grown to over 70 GB on my Mac.

There are numerous times when removing a cache or temp file may be part of a troubleshooting tip to return an app or the system to a more robust condition.

Temporary File And Cache Cleaner Free Up Space

Its also common to hear about removing these files to free up space on a Macs startup drive.

Unlike cache files, temp files are usually removed by the process that created them, usually when the process exits, or during a shutdown or restart cycle.

When you return to the same page, the browser can load the page data from the cache file, provided the page data hasnt changed.

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This saves you the time it would take to access the web server and download the entire page again.

Like the browser cache, the DNS cache can let your Mac grab the IP address of a website it has visited recently without having to perform a DNS lookup, which can take a great deal of time.

An example of a temp file is an application that has many levels of undo.

In the loosest of terms, the undo temp file holds the state of the app at each point a command was issued, letting you go back in time (undo) to previous states.

When you quit the app, the undo temp file is deleted since its no longer needed.

The tilde () in the last cache location is a shortcut for your home folder.

So, if your home folder was named tnelson, as mine is, the full path would be UserstnelsonLibraryCache.

As you can see, its easier to just use the shortcut than to type full pathnames.

However, apps that follow good coding practices will make use of a few standard locations.

Unfortunately, many of these standard locations are hidden from the Finder, blocking you from direct access.

You can use the following Terminal tip to open a Finder window on two of the most used temp locations.

The TMPDIR is a variable that holds the current temp directory pathname.

Temporary File And Cache Cleaner Mac OS Includes Maintenance

The Mac OS includes maintenance routines that are run at specific times to clear out unneeded cache and temp files.

In addition, most temp files are cleared out automatically by the app or process that created them.

The Mac OS will also remove many of the temp files whenever you shut down or restart your Mac.

As mentioned earlier, deleting cache files is a common troubleshooting tip.

In these cases, a specific cache file may have become corrupt, and as a result, contains bad or meaningless information that is causing a related app to lose its mind.

Cache files can also become excessively large, leading to long load times for the app that makes use of the file, or unusually long times for executing a specific function.

Mac Temporary File And Cache Cleaner